Blaze of Ember: The Man with Two Masks
by Empressimperia
Summary: Through the Prison of Shadowy Death to the Palace of Mass Destruction. Follow the path of the Masked Warrior to know the true end.
1. The Masked Man

**PLEASE READ THIS AUTHOR'S NOTE BEFORE SCROLLING DOWNWARD!**

 **DO NOT READ THIS SHORT STORY UNTIL YOU'VE READ BLAZE OF EMBER IF YOU DON'T WANT ANY SPOILERS! PLEASE!**

 **Okay, now that we've got the screaming out of the way here's the new short story that will answer some questions and reveal some secrets about Blaze of Ember. Chapter lengths will vary, as this is essentially all the story segments from a certain character's perspective that were originally going to go in the main story, but were cut out due to fears that they would give away important plot points too soon. Please read, review and enjoy!**

 **Also, for any Zootopia fans reading this, please check out my new Zootopia fan fiction, It's a Mad, Mad, Mad Animal World. Thanks!**

 **Empress Imperia.**

* * *

Long ago in ancient China, a fallen warrior received three things he would hold close for a long time. A gauntlet, a mask and a second chance.

The first had been necessary for the injury he suffered in the battle that took his first life. The second he had requested when he was still struggling to adjust to his new form. The third had been the first, given to him by the amethyst-eyed woman who sat before him on the exquisite massive throne. The throne room was a magnificent place, on par with the Hall of Warriors with its thousand scrolls and its ageless weapons. He'd heard a rumour around the Palace of the Body that the second palace in the Himalayas had a throne room identical to this one. Maybe one day he could see for himself.

Lady Hei Nuwang, ruthless, vengeful and immortal leader of the Children of Nuwa to whom the Masked Man had given his allegiance, looked very troubled. At first the Masked Man had assumed that the invasion of the Imperial City was going badly, but the message this morning had reported that all was well. The warrior's eyes narrowed behind his mask. Something else was going on.

"My dear warrior, I have a new task for you."

"Go on." The warrior replied patiently.

"We have received word of a prowler in the forest near the prison where we're holding the Dragon Warrior and the other prisoners."

"An attempted rescuer?" The warrior asked.

"Unknown. There have been several attempts to capture the intruder, but the soldiers we sent haven't returned."

"And you want me to have a go." He was already looking forward to the challenge, if he could even call it that. Being stuck in this palace for the two months since the Jade Palace was destroyed was driving him crazy.

Hei Nuwang shifted her crossed legs. "Good guess, but no. The last known sighting was a fair distance from the prison. If the intruder is indeed after the prisoners, we need to move them while we still can."

 _Oh no._

"This is where you come in. We've arranged a team to evacuate the three prisoners from the Valley of Peace and transport them here, and you're going with them."

The warrior bit back a growl and pulled the mask off. "With all due respect my lady, that fat panda is the _last_ person I want to see."

Hei Nuwang stood up on the throne, towering over him. "I don't recall giving you a choice. You don't have to go near the panda. You just have to make sure that whatever is sneaking around the forest doesn't get near the prisoners."

"If the Dragon Warrior doesn't defeat him first." The warrior replied bitterly.

"The three prisoners will be drugged throughout the journey. All you have to do is serve as their guard. Return to your room, pack lightly, and be ready to leave by sundown."

The warrior kept scowling. Bristling, Hei Nuwang stepped off the throne and got in his face, a fierce look in her eyes. "If it weren't for me, you would have stayed dead. Never forget that."

The warrior hadn't, and he did not appreciate the reminder. All the same he held his tongue. Hei Nuwang sat back down, satisfied at his defeat.

"Now that we've got the unpleasantries out of the way, you are dismissed. Report to me as soon as the delivery is complete. Remember your orders. You are not to hunt down the intruder. Your job is to make sure they don't go near the prisoners. We've lost a lot of men and I'd rather not lose you too."

"Good to know I'm still a valuable-" _But still partially expendable-_ "-asset." The warrior replied.

"One more thing." Hei Nuwang intertwined her fingers and leaned forward on her thighs. "The little girl is the highest priority prisoner. _Nothing_ is to happen to her. That is all. Dismissed."

* * *

Fifteen miles from the prison, as he trudged through the pathless forest that covered the Mystic Mountains, the warrior heard the sounds of battle. Both concerned and elated, he made sure his mask and gauntlet were secure and rushed to the scene on all fours. After days of travelling with no bandits or raiders in sight, he was itching for a fight, and considering he had no idea what was going on he technically wasn't hunting for the mysterious intruder.

He vaulted over a river, tore apart a pair of bushes, and was met with great disappointment. The small clearing was littering with spots of blood, fallen weapons and scuffmarks in the dirt. Behind the mask, the panther's ears flattened. He'd missed the battle. Or so he'd thought. One flat ear twitched at the sound of a cry coming from the left. A disarmed soldier, one of their own and not brainwashed with hypnotic elixir, was scrambling backwards and trying desperately to get away from the strange demonic creature with knife-like claws stalking towards him.

The masked warrior took three steps and with one kick accomplished what the lowly soldier couldn't. The demon skidded across the dirt and stopped just short of colliding with a tree, out for the count. The warrior huffed, feeling very pleased with himself even if the exchange barely counted as a real battle. It looked like he'd found the intruder.

He turned to the soldier to ask some questions and recognised him. The name he didn't bother to find out before now, but he'd knew the wolf was a high ranking soldier under Colonel Sao's direct command. He was supposed to be overseeing Master Tigress's transportation, which was not to get underway until the warrior's arrival. What was he doing so far from the prison?

"What the hell are you doing here?" The warrior asked harshly. "Where's the rest of your men?"

The soldier didn't get up. His armour was covered in claw marks, dirt, and some kind of black liquid. "We had no choice. The prison was attacked."

"Perfect." The warrior turned away to glare at the sky through the trees. "I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the prisoners have all escaped."

There was a rattle as the soldier shook his head. "We got the tiger out. We don't know about the others."

"Who attacked the prison? Was it this thi-" The soldier jerked a thumb towards the demon, but saw that it was gone. The warrior growled. The demon must have woke up and crawled away while he was playing the scolding superior.

"No. No!" The soldier's tone made the warrior pause mid-growl and turn back to him. The soldier had stood up. His eyes had turned wild. He was shaking like a dead leaf. He looked like he'd seen his own darkest sins reflected back at him.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" The warrior snarled.

"Listen... it's coming for us... you'll see!" The soldier was backing away now, towards the edge of the clearing. The warrior should have stopped him, but his body was too tense to move. Somehow he knew the half-crazed amateur wasn't talking about the demon he'd just KO'd.

The warrior's body loosened a little as he grew impatient. "You have five seconds to tell me what you're-"

"You'll see!" The soldier cried, cutting him off. He stumbled and hit his shoulder against a tree. "It's after the Children of Nuwa! We're all going to die!"

With that he snatched up a broken sword and sprinted out of the clearing, the warrior losing sight of him in seconds. The warrior should have gone after him. He knew this. But he had a mission to fulfill, a mission more important than ever now that the situation at the prison had changed. The warrior picked up a whole sword, dull grey with a black hilt, brushed off the dirt and continued on his way.

He was the greatest. He could take on anything that came his way. So why did he have moths in his stomach as he wondered what exactly had the insubordinate soldier so terrified?


	2. A Dark Surprise

**Here's chapter two of my Blaze of Ember side story.**

 **For any Zootopia fans reading this, please check out my newest fiction 'It's a Mad, Mad Animal World." Thanks!**

* * *

The masked warrior hadn't thought to look for the sheath that fitted the sword he'd acquired, but that had never stopped him before. The battle axes, daggers and hook swords he'd wielded hadn't had sheaths either.

He never saw the hysterical soldier again, but he did see a demonic creature not too long after that little incident. Whether it was the same creature he'd taken down before or one of its brothers or sisters, he couldn't tell. It was probably one of those species that always looked the same either way.

He'd paused in the middle of tree-hopping, a faster and more entertaining alternative to traversing the uneven forest floor, perching on a thick branch when he'd heard a rustle below and spotted the creature shoot out a bush like an agitated hornet and rush off on all fours through the trees until he lost sight of it. It had taken off in the direction of the abandoned mines he'd read about a long, long time ago. He had so dearly wanted to go after it. He'd wanted to follow the creature to its lair, where a whole pack of the beasts may have been waiting for him to beat down. But he had a mission to complete, and even if he hadn't the prison was under attack. Him getting sidetracked would royally tick Hei Nuwang off. The best he could do was report what he'd discovered to the lady as soon as possible.

And so he continued leaping from branch to branch, covering the remaining distance to the prison in record time, dreading the moment he would see the panda's face again. The worst part was that he'd been absolutely forbidden from attempting any sort of revenge. That conversation had been amongst the earlier ones he'd had with Lady Hei Nuwang...

 _"_ _Would you kindly explain to me exactly why I'm not allowed to lay a finger on that dumpling?" the warrior asked as calmly as possible, paws shaking as he held them behind his back._

 _"_ _Because he's not yours to kill." Hei Nuwang responded simply as they neared the door to the psycho hornet's glorified torture chamber. The warrior hated Sutoraiki almost as much as he hated his enemies. There was the warrior and the things he had done, and then there was_ him _. It didn't help that he had played a part in the warrior's rebirth. The warrior had been in the laboratory only once, and he had been unfortunate to do so during one of Sutoraiki's experiments. It had almost made him regret turning to the dark side._

 _Having no desire to visit a second time, the warrior stopped several feet from the door. Hei Nuwang scowled as she was forced to stop beside him. The warrior took some pleasure from that, having felt cheated out of his own revenge. "And what exactly have you got against him?" He asked, choosing his words carefully. "I thought your quarrel was with the Empress."_

 _"_ _Oh no, not me." Hei Nuwang said, her face giving nothing away. "I must speak to Sutoraiki. Why don't you go obliterate some wooden crocodiles or something?"_

 _The warrior wasn't done. "Wait a moment, if it's not you then who is it?!"_

 _Hei Nuwang had already turned towards the door. "You'll find out when he's ready."_

 _She went through the door and shut it behind her loud enough to make the warrior flinch._

Even now the warrior didn't know if he disliked her or not. It was true that she was often condescending towards him and most of her other subordinates, but then again he himself was guilty of a similar crime. After that conversation, he'd spent a small portion of his free time thinking about this 'he' Hei Nuwang had spoken of. He'd never asked about him again, but still he wondered. _Whoever 'he' is, he must be of a higher rank if his revenge is more important than mine._

Whatever. The warrior had already decided that if he couldn't get revenge then he wanted nothing more to do with the panda or his friends. All he wanted to do now was complete his mission and wash his hands of them for good.

 _But what if they'd already escaped?_ It suddenly occurred to him, making him stop and perch again. If the people attacking the prison were indeed allies, the panda and his lady friend could be out of their cells by now. Worse, they could have already left the prison itself. For all he knew, the warrior may already be too late.

The warrior took off like an arrow from a crossbow, the sword bouncing off his thigh harmlessly despite being unsheathed, it's sharp edge ravaging leaves and dismembering small branches from the shear power of his momentum. Eventually he plunged back to the forest floor and picked up the pace on all fours, hoping that by the time he'd got there he'd have come up with a good explanation for Hei Nuwang if the worst case scenario had indeed occurred.

He got his first view of the prison the moment he was finally clear of the forest. It was a daunting, ugly building that reflected its purpose: the containment and experimentation of the Children of Nuwa's captured enemies and innocent civilians. The warrior growled softly at the sight of it, having forgotten until now how much he hated prisons. Outwardly it looked normal. He saw no signs of the invasion the soldier had warned him about. The main action must be inside the building. The warrior continued onward, keeping an eye out for the closest entrance.

He found it as soon as he reached the building, a small stone door set into the wall. It had no handle, but it only took a hard push to get inside, though he had clenched his teeth at the harsh sound of scraping stone as he did so. The door was meant for the guards to get in, not for the prisoners to get out. He entered a narrow corridor weakly lit by candles set into the walls. For a prison supposedly under attack, it was suspiciously quiet. Either the walls were so thick that no sound could get through or he had missed the main action yet again.

The warriors guess started to lean towards the latter when he reached the door on the other side, pushed it open and entered the main room of the prison. It was a great hall, barred cells coverings every inch of the walls, except for the opposite wall where the double doors leading to the other areas of the prison stood closed. The warrior looked around and perked his ears, but the place was empty. None of the cells had prisoners, but their doors were all closed. The warrior's posture tensed as he silently crossed the massive room in a beeline for the double doors. Whatever was going on, it was no ordinary invasion. If the Dragon Empress herself was behind this, things could go south in a hurry...

 _Creeeaaak!_

The warrior snarled and leapt into his stance as one of the double doors opened, until he saw that it was another of their own soldiers.

This was not the hysterical soldier he'd met in the forest. This was a bull, and he was badly injured. One arm was soaked in blood and dangling uselessly by his side as he staggered forward, his good arm pointing at the masked man with a cracked mace.  
"Who- who are you?!" He stammered, looking like he was trying very hard to regain the composure he had lost.

The warrior relaxed and held his paws up, needing to calm the soldier down if he was going to get anything helpful out of him.

"Calm down. I was sent by Lady Hei Nu-" He was stopped by a mass of inky black tendrils shooting up in front of his face.

The warrior stepped back, not quite sure what had happened. The tendrils were coming from a black puddle of the floor that definitely had not been there before. The warrior looked up to the soldier for an explanation, but then he suddenly disappeared behind a pillar of black, a lean unnatural blackness that emitted dark mist from every part of its body.

 _Demon._

And not like any the warrior had ever seen before. If it had been anything else, another demon or a mortal, his first instinct would have been to charge into battle with an eager bloodlust. But now the warrior was frozen, stunned and intrigued by this unique being as it stalked towards the injured soldier.

The soldier fell back, now as terrified as the soldier in the forest. He threw the broken mace, which bounced harmlessly off the creature's chest, doing nothing to slow it. The soldier started screaming and scrambling backwards, but didn't get far as the creature's tendrils reached for him. Snaring him by the hip and chest the tendrils lifted him into the air. The creature tilted its head upward to examine its catch, and the warrior took in the long muzzle and the blank, glowing blue eyes.

And then there was a horrible _crunching_ sound like celery as the tendrils holding the chest twisted one way, the tendrils holding the hip the other. The soldier stopped screaming, his expression going blank at he faced the cells on the left, his legs facing the cells on the right. The warrior lost all feeling in his own limbs. _Crunch._ The tendrils twisted again in opposite directions, the upper half facing the creature and the lower half facing the double doors. One more time and the soldier would surely come apart. Instead the tendrils raised him up and slammed him into the floor. He exploded into the same black mist that floated from his killer's body.

Then the creature turned its attention on the masked warrior.

An ancient instinct that had existed within the warrior's kind for millennia overcame the younger instinct to welcome the challenge. It screamed at him to run, that to fight this creature was tantamount to committing suicide. For whatever reason, whether it was a weakened resolve from witnessing the soldier's gruesome death or just a newly born cowardice, the warrior obeyed. He dodged the tendrils and ran for it, sprinting through the doors, slamming them shut and sealing them with a thick metal beam. He continued running, unwillingly to wait to see if they held.

He finally stopped halfway through the third corridor he entered, slipping into one of the empty cells and taking a seat on the hard wooden bed. He pulled out the sword, clutching it with cold paws. The corridor was a quiet as the grave.

The warrior pulled off his mask and wiped the sweat off his face. _So much for an escaped panda being the worst case scenario._


	3. Invulnerable

The masked warrior dug his sharp claws into his palm, causing pain and shedding blood. This was his self-inflicted punishment for his inexplicable moment of cowardice. He should have fought the creature, which was almost certainly the prowler responsible for the disappearances. Instead he'd fled with his blackened tail between his legs. He had felt a fear he hadn't felt since childhood, since that time he'd been caught somewhere he shouldn't. It had been a sacred place where only certain adults were adult to enter, and he'd been given the classic punishment of being sent to bed without his supper. The warrior forced away the memory, reminding himself that he'd vowed to sever all ties with his past life.

The warrior wiped the blood on his pants and pulled out his sword before leaving the cell, snarling under his breath. It would not happen again.

The creature must have lost his scent, for he didn't see it again for some time. Unfortunately he didn't see any soldiers either, not even their cold, bloody corpses. Had they all met the same fate as the soldier from before, reduced to black mist by the great blue-eyed beast? Perhaps.

Just as he was thinking that the same fate might have befallen the panda, he heard noises coming from the kitchen he was approaching at that moment. The warrior went immediately into stealth mode, crouching low and moving towards the door with slow, light steps. As he got closer he realised that he was hearing the sounds of someone eating. Or something.

The warrior bit the inside of his mouth and reached for the door. He would not run away this time. The door opened with a small creak.

The warrior didn't know if he should feel lucky. It was the panda. He was standing by a table, his mouth grotesquely stuffed with dumplings.

It was like a furnace flaring to life inside his body. As he stared at the panda, the masked warrior was overcome with the overwhelming need to rush at him with all he had, to beat him until he was blue and red all over. He'd told himself he wanted nothing more to do with his past life, or the panda who had ended it. But that was before he'd seen him face to face for the first time since his rebirth, reawakening a burning hellfire and rage and hate.

The panda pulled out a frying pan and went into a stance. The warrior prepared to do the same with his sword. Until now he'd had no idea just how much he really wanted-

 _SMASH!_

A part of the wall back down the corridor imploded, a rhino soldier slamming into the opposite wall and hitting the floor in a crumpled heap. Black tendrils snaked out the crumbling hole, grabbing the rhino's limbs and pulling him back through. Black mist sprayed from the hole, followed by-

"Dammit!"

Snapped out of his bloodlust, the warrior remembered that Hei Nuwang wanted the panda alive. He had to lure the creature away from him, until they were somewhere they could battle without inconvenience.

The warrior whirled and ran, reaching the end of the corridor and smashing through the door there, finding himself in a bigger room that had undoubtedly been the scene of a vicious battle. He gave himself half a second to take in the overturned tables, the orphaned weapons, the red stains here and there, before they all became blurred shapes as he took off again at full speed.

He leapt straight over the clustered, bloody mess, hearing the soft footfalls of the creature as it followed him into the room. How on earth could it be so quiet?

Figuring this would be as good a place as any, the warrior stopped on a clear part of the floor and turned, sword in hand. The creature continued onward, ignoring the debris as it zoned in on the warrior.

The tendrils shot out, quick as lightning. Just as fast himself, the warrior leap out of the way, swinging his sword at the same time. Instead of being cut, the tendrils tangled themselves around the blade like weeds and pulled it from his grasp as he flew through the air.

Unperturbed, the warrior landed right before the creature and plunged his fist into its abdomen.

The only way he could describe it was like punching soft ice. Like flesh, the creature's form shuddered and his fist sank slightly. Except flesh did not leave water soaking through his clothing and into his fur. The warrior stared at the black skin as he pulled his fist away, his mind telling him that this was not sweat. The creature's body was made up entirely of water.

 _What... what_ is _this thing?_

Before he could try again, the creature grabbed him by the skull with its own hand and threw him out the window.


	4. Lost Stronghold

The masked warrior had been knocked out cold and dislocated his shoulder upon hitting the rough ground below the window. Right after he awoke, the dislocation gave him pain, which in turn gave him rage. Rage at Hei Nuwang for dragging him into this mess, rage at the creature for dealing him such a humiliating defeat, and above all rage at himself for his costly hesitation.

With his fangs biting the inside of his mouth hard enough to shed blood, the warrior popped his shoulder back into place. The pain was several magnitudes worse than the injury itself, but it was nothing he hadn't experienced before. As the pain gradually dulled into a tolerable ache, the warrior looked around the trunk of the tree he'd taken rest beneath.

Crap had hit the hippo's tail, making all hell break loose, culminating the mother of all hellfires. Not long after he'd retreated into the forest to recover until he could go back and try to recapture the panda without running into the creature again, the prison caught fire and collapsed in on itself, almost certainly the work of Ember. If there had been any survivors in there before, there weren't now.

The warrior didn't feel very lucky. One of their main strongholds was gone, and the panda had very likely gone with it. How the hell was he going to explain this to Hei Nuwang without getting himself his very own amethyst coffin?

In any case, he couldn't put it off any longer. He pulled out the magic mirror Hei Nuwang and given him and waited until her visage appeared in the glassy surface. With his heart clenching and unclenching, the warrior explained everything. He told her what had been making her men disappear. He told her that the panda may very well be dead. He told her about the prison's obliteration. She listened in complete silence, her purple eyes narrow slits. The warrior finished his report and waited for her to explode.

"So not only do we have a bunch of fugitives and the damned empress to worry about, we have goddamned demon as well." She said bluntly.

"Yes, my lady." He said. "I tried to kill it myself, but normal weapons don't seem to work."

"What about the little girl. Did you find her?"

"I'm sorry, but I didn't see her before the palace's destruction.

Hei Nuwang stood up so he couldn't see her head and started pacing. With each sentence she passed the mirror. "Well. Perfect. Over two hundred men dead in one fell swoop. With the two pandas probably dead too. I'm surrounded by idiots and monsters. Damn you all to hell."

"You're taking this remarkably well."

Hei Nuwang stopped pacing at glared at him. "If I lose it now, she wins."

"You think she and the creature are connected?"

"She had a hand in the Yetis' creation. I wouldn't put it past her to cook up a new lackey to replace the one she lost in the white palace."

"Did they ever find the body, my lady?"

"Not important." Hei Nuwang waved away the question. "Here are your new orders. You are to return to the prison and confirm that the prisoners are indeed dead. Whether you find their bodies or not, you are to then go to the Imperial City to help General Long Feng in any way you can."

"You mean to keep an eye on him." Hei Nuwang raised an eyebrow at that. "Unless you've forgotten what happened to the last general."

"I haven't. Long Feng is stronger than that feathered freak."

The warrior shrugged. "If you say so, my lady. And if I may ask one more question: what do I do if I go back to the prison and one or both the pandas are still alive?"

"Then you take them to the Imperial City for Long Feng to detain. Simple."

The mirror went blank as the warrior felt ice-cold water suddenly form beneath his feet. The mirror fell from his paws as he leapt, barely clearing the black tendrils that lashed out from the black stain on the ground he'd been standing on. The warrior landed on normal muddy ground as the creature rose from the black stain, blue eyes fixed on its new quarry...


	5. Unfortunate Coincidences

Thrice.

Thrice the creature found him.

Thrice the masked warrior was forced to run like a scared rat.

Thrice he barely escaped with his life.

It was right after he'd escaped the second chase since the creature attacked him in the forest that he'd come to realise that these incidents were not unfortunate coincidences. The creature was hunting him, and only him.

During his troubled journey to the Imperial City he'd learned to avoid water, the very essence of the creature and one of its ways of travel. It soon became a habit of his to avoid shadows and dark places as well. He hadn't slept since the first chase, which wasn't any benefit to his already distressed mind.

The universe was testing him. It must be. Why else would fate saddle him with an invincible beast that would never leave until he did? This must be the ultimate test of his worth, one that made the test in his past life pale in comparison.

Or was this his punishment? Was the beast that would not die the universe's way punishing him for the things he had done? For allying with the Children of Nuwa? For taking that little girl and handing her to Hei Nuwang for the sole purpose of hurting the people who had hurt him?

He'd left the palace almost immediately after arriving and receiving his instructions from General Long Feng. The panda had been spotted entering the city, and it was the warrior's job to bring him back.

He found the panda in the burning remains of the market. Attempted an ambush which the panda dodged just in time.

"Nice try, metal head." The panda's taunt was as colourless as his fur.

"I've been looking for you, panda. Lady Hei Nuwang has been worried about you ever since you left the prison."

"If she thinks I'm going back without a fight, she's an idiot. And you're an even bigger idiot if you think you even have a chance of taking me back."

The warrior felt that familiar desire for revenge flare up within him, burning like hellfire. "Still the same arrogant little upstart. You're coming with me if I have to knock you out and drag your massive rear myself."

"I'd like to see you try."

This was it. The warrior would finally get his rematch.

And that was when the two claymen interrupted.

"You've got to be bloody joking." The warrior snarled when he saw the two crocs with their sword and axe. Long Feng knew full well that the warrior was already on the panda's tail. Did he think the warrior wasn't up to the task?

Standing on either end of the street, the clay crocs broke into a sprint. Back to back with the panda, the warrior tried the long-range solution first, sending a volley of shuriken into the axe croc's skull. But the terra cotta fiend felt no pain and had no brain. The panda and the warrior stepped to the side to avoid the sword and axe as they plunged into the ground they had been standing on. The panda first tried his makeshift meteor hammer and then tried running, with the sword croc in hot pursuit.

As for the masked warrior, he chose to forego weapons and went for the croc's legs, kicking them out from beneath the false creature. It felt to the ground but did not break, even when the warrior leapt ten feet in the air and slammed its fist into the croc's chest. Quick as lightning, the axe croc struck the warrior in the face with the back of its axe, knocking him back thirty feet. Hei Nuwang must have added a twist to the alchemic recipe to strengthen their orange shells.

Saved from being knocked out by his masked, the warrior shook his head and used a broken stall to pull himself up. The first thing he saw once he was upright was the sword croc cleaving through a line of stalls to get at the struggling panda.

Hei Nuwang wanted him alive. Gnashing his teeth, the warrior threw a shuriken at the sword croc's head.

Now the warrior had two giant blade wielding crocs on his tail. As they started another sprint, the warrior started running down the street. A rush of air gave him a millisecond's warning to duck before a giant sword swung at him. _Damn, these things are fast!_ As he neared a cluster of abandoned cannons he barely ducked the axe, which instead took out a wooden column. The warrior flipped over a toppled cannon, which was then almost cleaved into three separate pieces by the weapons. The warrior stopped before the other cannons and faced his formidable opponents. The panda rushed to join him, picked up a fallen shuriken, and threw it at the fuse of one of the cannons.

What he did next was something only the panda was crazy enough to pull off.

After the cannonball took out both warriors with a level of force the warrior could only dream of reaching, the two warriors turned to face each other.

The warrior glowered behind his mask. He'd heard stories of the panda's cannonball redirecting technique, but he'd never thought it would be used to upstage him. Had he been given enough time to figure out his own strategy, the warrior could have taken them both down himself.

"Not bad." The warrior said reluctantly. "But I'm still taking you back."

"And you're still an idiot for thinking you can." The panda replied nonchalantly. "And furthermore, you can tell this Hei Nuwang to stick it where the sun don't..." He noticed something above the warrior's head and his smug grin vanished. "... shine. Uh oh."

Somehow the warrior knew what was scared the panda before a black tendril caught him by his wide waist and lifted him into the air. Feeling that cold dread that had become familiar to him after he realised the creature was hunting him, the warrior spun round and looked up to see it standing on one of the shorter buildings.

He'd made the mistake of getting distracted. He first felt the panda swing into him like a giant mace, then warm air rushing fast him as he flew across the street and made a crumbling dent in another building. For a second the warrior thought the creature's imaginative use of its captive had broken every bone in his body. Yet he managed to get up despite his many, many aches and pains. The creature dropped the panda and leapt from the other building, touching down on the cracked pavement without a sound. Then it started toward him.

"Here we go again." The warrior muttered. There was a crash as the dent he'd made fell apart completely, making an opening in the wall behind him and revealing a room engulfed in fire. The warrior shrugged and went through it. If the creature's affinity was water, maybe fire was its weakness.


	6. New Grievance

Fire was not the creature's weakness.

The masked warrior had learned this to his sorrow as he was running through the burning building. He'd looked back to see the creature cutting a path of misty darkness through the flames as it pursued him. The flames did not burn it, and its black tendrils tossed aside the furniture and debris that would have otherwise blocked its way. Sensing that the creature was gaining, the warrior punched a hole through the wall next to him and fled through it. He didn't remember much of what happened between that and his eventual escape. He'd run through ruined street after ruined street after ruined street, picked up a fallen axe along the way and threw it at the creature's chest. The axe had sunk all the way into its chest and was never seen again. It had screamed, not in pain but in hate.

The next thing he knew, he had climbed up the side of the wall that surrounded the royal palace and was sprinting across the grounds, ignoring the soldiers who either stared in confusion or tried to stop him. He didn't realize until he was through the entrance to the central building that the creature had stopped following him. When exactly it had ended the chase, whether it was before or after its prey had reached the palace, was unknown.

The warrior felt no relief. The creature would return. It always did.

Then he remembered where he was and his blood boiled. In this building was the overzealous rhino who sabotaged the warrior's mission. In furious silence he made his way to the big hall where Long Feng was overseeing the invasion.

"Oh, it's you." Long Feng said when the warrior confronted him, not looking happy at all.

"Yes!" The warrior ripped off his mask, exposing the pure fury on his face. "It's me, you stupid grunt! You sent those earth made freaks after us! You nearly got me cut up into little pieces!"

"You were with the panda?" Long Feng asked. The warrior looked over the rhino's shoulder and saw most of the Furious Five chain to a column with the spy Mei Ling. It seemed the brainwashed goons had done something right for once. "I sent the terra cotta warriors after him hours ago. Why haven't they returned? Did you destroy them?"

"What choice did I have? They nearly killed me!"

Izumi stormed over. "What about the panda? Where's that fat idiot?" She got her answer from the glare the warrior gave her. "You mean you have actually found the panda Lady Hei Nuwang is after and you didn't bring him in? You've got to be kidding me!"

"No, I gave him some candy for taking out the big bad men and sent him on his merry way. Of course I tried to bring him in, you scar-faced pussycat!"

"That's enough!" Long Feng shouted. "Tell us what happened!"

The warrior gave a quick and to the point explanation of the incident with the creature. "By the time I lost it and headed back, he was gone." He lied because he knew the panda would have been long gone by the time the warrior had travelled from the palace back to the market. That and he didn't want to admit that he'd been too afraid to go back.

"Damn it!" Long Feng cracked a pillar with his fist. "One thing after another! Damn that woman..."

Sao stepped in. "Sir, I thought Lady Hei Nuwang said that it was unlikely that the creature is associated with Ember."

"You don't know her like I do!" Long Feng snapped. "Ember is the problem here! Always has been!"

"I know that, it's just..."

Long Feng spun round and loomed over him. "Just _what_ , colonel?"

Sao shrank a little. "Sir, there's something about that creature. I'm not sure what it is, but I'm afraid."

"Man up, soldier." Long Feng snarled. "I want you to take some men and head back out into the city. Find the panda and take him alive." He turned to Izumi. "As for you, take our artificially reincarnated friend here and go after the creature."

The masked warrior couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What part of 'this thing can't die' did you not understand?!"

"I'm not asking you to kill it, you moron. I'm asking you to capture it." Long Feng held up the mirror. "I've just spoken to our mistress, and she has ordered me to make the creature a priority. She wants it alive so she can learn what it is and why it's interfering with our operation."

"How are we supposed to find and catch it with next to no info about it?" Izumi asked.

Long Feng whispered something in Izumi's ear. Izumi blinked and her eyes glanced at the warrior. Long Feng stepped away. "Your old boss didn't make you second in command for your looks. You'll think of something."

Izumi nodded and tapped the warrior with the flat of the polished knife. " _Yuko!_ "

The warrior didn't know Japanese, but guessed anyway that he and Izumi were supposed to leave. They left the hall and found some peace and quiet in a smaller room that had nothing but a mat, table and candle.

Izumi leaned in one corner, the masked warrior the other.

They didn't speak for a while, deep in different, troubling thoughts. Izumi pulled out a knife and started sharpening her claws. The warrior fidgeted with his gauntlet as he remembered the creature's scream. It had been the first real sound it had made since their first meeting in the prison, but it had not been the first time the warrior had heard it. "Why does this thing have it out for you?" Izumi asked suddenly.

"I have no idea." Said the warrior. "But I have a feeling that this creature may be connected to the little girl."

Izumi's eyes narrowed. "That puny snowball? What makes you think that?"

"That scream it made when it was chasing me..." The warrior swallowed. "I heard it before. Right before I found that kid in the forest."

Izumi scoffed. "You think it's mad because we committed child abduction?"

The warrior gazed directly at her. "All I know is that kid creeps me out, and I'm not the only one. She acts normal enough, but..."

"Maybe the creature's causing us trouble because it's after you." Izumi said. "You know, you still haven't told me who you were before Lady Hei Nuwang brought you back in that jar."

"And I probably never will. Are we going to figure out a way to catch this creature or not?"


	7. Gaol

After the masked warrior revealed that the creature had been using shadows to hunt him down, Izumi used that information to come up with a convoluted but feasible plan.

Step one: lure the creature to the secondary prison hall. Step two: kill the torches with strategically placed buckets of water. Step three: while the alchemic crystals that were activated by darkness were blinding the creature, turn on the defense system and trap it inside the hall. Step four: keep the creature there until a way to incapacitate it is found.

It was four simple steps, but what made the plan convoluted was all the prep they had to make before the trap was ready. First they had to get enough crystals, hundreds and hundreds of Hei Nuwang's luminous creations. Then they had to place the crystals in every nook and cranny of the hall so that no shadow would be left for the creature to escape through. Then they had to set the water buckets. Then they had to set up their own positions. Finally, they had to choose the bait.

"Why me?" The masked warrior growled. "I know damn well it's because the creature is hunting me, but why not someone else?"

"There is no-one else." Izumi replied simply. "No-one else it wants more than you, so far as we know."

"No." The warrior snarled and crossed his arms. "I will not be used like a worm on a fishhook. Find someone else."

"Get over yourself!" Izumi pointed a long thin knife right at the unflinching warrior's throat. "There is more at stake here than your damn pride! Do as I say, or Hei Nuwang will hear of your insubordination! You owe her quite a bit, you know!"

The warrior growled from his throat, but acknowledged his defeat.

And so he left the prison, leaving Izumi and the soldiers to make the final preparations, and took a round trip around the palace grounds. This was he was to lure in the creature. Once he was sure that it was once again stalking him, he would make his way back to the prison where he would supposedly be alone. He would then cross the secondary hall where the trap was set, and once he was clear and the creature was inside, Izumi and her men would strike.

Easier said than done.

As he was slowly walking back to the prison entrance, the trap door inside the base of the tower, he felt a cold fear rise up within his muscular black body, as if his own chi was freezing within the proximity of his invulnerable stalker. He turned his head. The path behind him was darker than he remembered it being. He didn't see the creature, but he had learned to feel its presence.

He went through the trapdoor, keeping composed and maintaining a steady pace, not wanting to arouse the creature's suspicion. He reached the heavy door that lead into the secondary hall. He'd spent a full hour patrolling. Izumi had surely finished by now.

He saw the notch on the door, made by a sharp knife. That was the sign. The trap was set. He quickened his pace just a little, opened the heavy door with no effort, and entered the room.

The last thing he expected was to find the fat panda standing there.

"What the hell?" The panda was looking up at the strangely placed water buckets.

"What the hell?" The warrior asked in response.

The panda jumped twice. The first time was out of fright, the second was done as he entered his stance.

"You!"

The warrior clenched his fists and strode towards the panda. He had to get that idiot out of here before he screwed up the plan. "Get out of here! You'll ruin every-"

Too late. He saw the creature descend head fist from a dark stain on the ceiling. Already, their time was up. He would have to leave the panda to be trapped with the creature.  
"Damn it!" He sprinted to the exit on the other side, dodging a punch from the panda along the way. The bars came down and he rolled under just in time. A second later the water buckets were released. The torches were doused and the warrior felt the light of hundreds of purple crystals slam into his eyes. He spun round and pressed his paws to his eyes, teeth clenched from the unexpected pain.

He decided not to stick around and wait to see if the trap had worked. That and he wanted to get as far away from this torturous light as possible. He opened his eyes to find flashing multicolored shapes dancing in his vision. He'd been temporarily blinded. He staggered away in what he assumed to be the opposite direction of the secondary hall. He heard a grinding sound behind him but didn't think too much on in.

When the shapes finally subsided and he could finally see again, he found that he was in the underground chamber at the bottom of the palace's well. The warrior shot a dark look at the fenced pool. He'd learned by now to stay away from water. He wasn't taking any chances until he was sure that the creature was trapped. Deciding to bite the arrow and go back to find out for himself, the warrior turned and started to head back the way he came.

The creature dropped in front of the door on all fours, shocking the warrior so badly that he fell backwards.

Blue eyes fixed on the warrior, the creature straightened upright and advanced without a sound. The warrior scurried backwards until his back hit the fence that surrounded the pool. Heart pounding, chest heaving, the warrior was sure that this was it. Izumi's literally brilliant plan had failed. He was going to die.

But there was no way in hell that he was going to go down without a fight.

The creature reached out to grab him. The masked warrior started to push himself up.

The air between them exploded in red and everything went black.


	8. Lady of Fate

When the masked warrior came to, the first thing he noticed was that the pool was on fire.

No, it wasn't, he realized as his vision cleared. It was the fence that surrounded the pool that was engulfed in crimson fire. A minor casualty of that strange explosion that had come out of nowhere, right when the creature was about to-

Creature!

The warrior scrambled to his feet and looked around for the creature. It was gone. The explosion had either killed it or scared it off.

Strange. Even a hardened warrior such as himself should at least be feeling sore after getting caught in an explosion, and yet all he felt was lightheadedness. There were scorch marks on his clothes, but that was it. What the hell had that explosion been, anyway?

 _Good afternoon, old friend. Long time, no see._

The warrior turned. His heart almost stopped. A dragon-headed woman in black was standing in the middle of the pool, perched on the still water like it was solid ground.

 _Oh gods. It's her._

The warrior leapt into his stance and debated whether or not he should attack first. Should he risk getting nerve attacked? If only he could figure out how to defend against her unique variation of that ancient technique, he could take her down easily. For her part, Ember merely stared at him with her arms hanging limply by her sides. Finding this to be more than a little creepy, the warrior snapped at her. "What the hell do you want?"

 _You're welcome._ The Dragon Empress replied dryly.

"That was you, just now?"

 _I remember you. We fought together a long time ago. For old time's sake, I couldn't just stand by and watch that creature kill you._

"Thanks, but I can take care of myself!" The warrior replied defiantly; even as he felt a sinking feeling that he did in fact know this woman.

 _... I can see that._

The warrior bristled, especially when he realized his foot was positioned incorrectly and failed to right himself before she noticed.

 _What's happening to you? You've lost your touch. Why do you think that is?_

"I'm out of practice." The warrior said quickly, even though he'd been training every day until that fateful trip to the prison.

Ember hissed. _That's right. Ignore your gut instinct. Tighten that leash around your throat. Let her use you. Let yourself rot._

"Who the hell are you?" The warrior took a step towards her. Ember didn't flinch. "Take off your helmet so I can recognize you!"

 _You first._ With a flick of her paw, the warrior's helmet flew off in a rush of hot air, revealing his black face. _What the hell did Hei Nuwang do to you?_

"I don't know, alright!" The warrior glared daggers as he retrieved his helmet and put it back on. "Who cares if she made me weaker? Why do you care?!"

 _Because that's more or less what she did to me._

With that, Ember pulled off her helmet.

"Yujin?!"

* * *

The warrior felt a powerful urge to reach out and touch the woman before him, more than anything to make sure she was real. This extraordinary woman, this fierce warrior who had perished long before the day his past life fell apart. And yet here she was, so fearsome and yet so... so beautiful. But how could she be beautiful? They'd told him that she'd been burned all over!

 _You don't despise me?_

"How could I despise you?

 _You despise everyone else you knew before you died. Why should I be any different?_

"You're different! You died before everything went to hell! Or did you ever actually die?"

 _I did not die... I wish that I had. But I'm not leaving this realm until Hei Nuwang does!_

"I don't blame you. I know how it feels to be betrayed." The warrior frowned. "But I've got a score to settle, and Hei Nuwang is my best chance of doing that."

Fire danced in Yujin's eyes. _Didn't you learn anything from the first time?_

"I did. A panda's stomach isn't as soft as you'd think it is."

 _So you didn't learn. I_ get _it, but whatever injustice you think you've suffered is nothing compared to what that woman put me through. My baby is dead because of her! I suffered a fate worse than death!_

The warrior bit his lower lip. "So did I!"

 _That wasn't a fate worse than death! It was justice! You were too self-centered and narrow-minded to realize that, and nothing has changed! You're too consumed in your own delusions of grandeur and victimization to see what is truly happening to you, or that this is more than just a scheme of world domination! You're aware of Hei Nuwang's priorities, I know you are! More than anything in the world, she wants the lives of me, the Dragon Warrior, and the innocent peasant girl_ you _kidnapped! Now, why would she want_ her _? How would she benefit from her destruction?_

"How the hell should I know?!"

 _Why don't you try asking that beast next time it shows up? At least_ she _knows to look at what's around her!_

"Wait, do you know what that creature is?!" The warrior yelled, even as Yujin disappeared in another red flash. "What the hell does it want with me?! Damn it!"


	9. Inverted Perspective

What had finally caused 'herself' to give in and give birth to the creature had been the repeating of history.

When 'herself' had almost reached the Jade Palace after the awful reunion with the demon who had murdered her and her beloved children, and watched the closest thing Oogway had ever had to a son be mortally wounded before her eyes, it had been the tragedy of one thousand years ago all over again. The demon had once again invaded her home, hurt her children, and tried to kill her closest friend.

And once again, he'd been aided by Hei Nuwang, her own flesh and blood. Her, and one other betrayer.

She stepped through the doorway into the darkened room of crates, and there he was, standing guard by the bound form of Emperor Xian.

She stalked toward him, and he slowly backed away from his hostage. She looked around the large room, but the two felines appeared to be alone. She continued on towards the warrior, waiting for him to turn and run. The tiger stared at her in terror, helpless in his chains, but he had no reason to be afraid. It was not his life she wanted. She wouldn't take his life even to save herself. It was she who had lent her power to save him from death when 'herself' touched his bloody arm, and she had sensed how weak his chi was. Now, as she slowly approached them, she sensed no wounds or ailments on him. His chi was strong. Once her business with the warrior who betrayed her friend and hurt her children was finished, she would leave him untouched. The Dragon Warrior would be there soon.

She got closer to the warrior, who had backed into the wall behind him. She was about to pass Xian when a small grunt escaped him.

She stopped and bent down to look into his tea-coloured eyes. She saw fear but no pain. Still she sensed no abnormality in the flow of his chi, but she did sense something familiar. Bright burning red, fiercer than a forest fire, and full of indomitable life. She had experienced it a little while earlier in the well by the prison, in the form of a powerful blast of energy that had driven her to temporarily abandon the hunt. It was her child's chi. There were small traces of it in his physically powerful body, and there were several possible reasons for this. Perhaps her child healed him in the past, like she herself had done in the Himalayas. Perhaps her child had learned the art of kung fu and used one of her mental techniques on him. Perhaps, and this possibility intrigued her most of all, her child had unknowingly passed on the chi during a night of passion.

Xian's eyes glanced to the side. She turned her head. Though she saw nothing, her entire body stiffened like ice. Something was wrong. The warrior had not moved away from the back wall.

She stared at the empty space Xian had looked at. Something was there. She could sense the chi of several people, but she couldn't determine their exact location.

But she knew a way around that.

Water was one of the most malleable elements in existence, and made up her entire body. As she was being born from 'herself', the water had merged with the dark of the night and the shadows of the trees to give her the power to travel through the darkness itself. As a result the darkness could not blind her, but for whatever reason her sight was not the only sense that was strengthened. Perhaps the universe had strengthened her ears as well in anticipation of this very moment. She wouldn't be surprised. The universe's very stability was at stake if the Children of Nuwa weren't stopped.

So she clicked with her maw, much like the fliers of the night did so in order to make up for their poor sight, and felt the sound come back to her.

And there they were. A line of invisible assassins lined the wall Xian had looked at, bearing weapons and crowns that she remembered were Shadow Crowns. Shadow Crowns could make one invisible to the naked eye, but it did not make them intangible.

So once again, the warrior had tried to use her desire to kill him against her. Once again, he had failed. He and the scarred bobtail. They would soon pay for their arrogance. They all would, and Hei Nuwang would be last, for she was the creature's ultimate reason for separating herself from 'herself'.

She would not return to 'herself' until she had destroyed Hei Nuwang and everything she had betrayed her family for. She would rip apart the red-eyed demon Hei Nuwang had sold her out to before sinking her tendrils into her flesh and freeze her blackened heart.

But first she had a masked warrior to kill.


	10. Violent Objection

On the door of a quiet room in the Palace of the Body, the masked warrior knocked.

"If you wear a mask, come in."

The warrior entered. Hei Nuwang looked depressed as she sat in a chair on the other side of the room. It was known that Hei Nuwang would often confine herself in a room such as this when she needed time alone. To be summoned here instead of the Throne Room meant that something about the coming exchange would be different. That worried him, but he still stepped toward her and bowed respectfully. "What are my orders now, my lady?"

Hei Nuwang didn't look at him. She'd been sullen since her encounter with the creature. "I will give you your orders in a moment. We've recaptured my sister and the girl."

The warrior was thankful for his mask at that moment, for his jaw had dropped. "You've recaptured Yujin?"

"No." Hei Nuwang snarled. "We failed to find her again after that damned panda helped her escape. I'm talking about my other sister. She's in the prison as we speak."

The warrior folded his arms. "Why didn't you tell me that the Dragon Empress was an old friend of mine?"

"You know why."

"I want to hear your version."

Hei Nuwang scowled. "Honestly, I doubted that you would care. Ever since I revived you you've either been obsessed with revenge or apathetic about everything around you. The reason I didn't tell you was because I didn't think it would matter to you whether or not you were fighting a person from your past."

"Why did you do it?" He asked. "Why did you try to kill her?"

Hei Nuwang sighed. She was clearly getting tired of giving the same rant over and over. "The same reason you turned against your own family. She betrayed us. She sided with the turtle that caused the death of our mother. Then she married a mortal and gave birth to a monster."

"From what I've heard, you gave her good reason to abandon you." the warrior retorted.

Hei Nuwang gave him an evil glare. "Watch your tongue."

The warrior took a step back. "I misspoke. Forgive me."

"Truly, I'm surprised you're upset by this. I'd have thought that you wanted to get rid of everything and everyone that was a part of your past."

"Yujin is different. She never betrayed me."

Hei Nuwang's eyes narrowed. "She never loved you, either. Not like she loved Xian."

The warrior felt hot all over. How did she know? "That wasn't love. We were young, and-"

"You only had that one night, but you never did get over her." The corners of Hei Nuwang's mouth curved upward for the first time in days. "I heard you tore the barracks apart when you heard the news."

"How did you-"

"But no matter." Hei Nuwang clasped her paws together. "You want revenge against the people who hurt you and freedom from the beast that hunts you and now you're getting it."

"What do you mean?" the warrior asked.

"I told you that we recaptured the child who was living with them, do you remember?"

"That was minutes ago, of course I remember. But I don't remember you telling me why this child is so important."

"Sutoraiki's experiments confirmed it. She gave birth to the creature, likely on the same night you found her and brought her to us."

"... Gave... Birth...?"

"Not conventionally, you fool. You see, she didn't truly give birth. She and the creature separated. The creature is her daughter. Her sister. Herself."

Speechless for a few seconds, the warrior struggled to understand what she was saying. "What the hell is this kid?"

"She is the same as you. A reincarnation of a being from a past life. A being you may have heard of in Oogway's stories."

"There were a lot of people in Oogway's stories. Who is it?"

"My mother. Nuwa. Mother of Mortals and First Queen of all China."

"No wonder you wanted her back. So what you're telling me is that the girl and the creature are Nuwa's good and evil selves."

"Correct."

"So what happens to the girl? Are you going to keep her here in a nice comfy prison where she can't die a second time?"

Hei Nuwang bit her lower lip, drawing blood. As she started speaking, the tooth marks healed before his eyes with a small purple light. "This is your order. The child is in the Throne Room. You are to go there immediately and kill her."

Had it been some random stranger, he would have bowed and accepted the order. Had it been an old enemy, he would have smiled and told her he would gladly obey.

Instead his heart dropped into the very bottom of his stomach and he took another step back from her. "What?"

"This is your revenge. You will kill the child your enemies risked their lives protecting." Hei Nuwand didn't look happy about it either.

The warrior breathed slowly, deeply, fighting through the shock. "Why?"

"You despise her protectors. I thought you would want to be the one to do it."

"No. I mean why kill her?" The warrior was frozen in disbelief. "You've spent the last minute talking about how much you wish to avenge her, and then you're ordering me to do _this_? What Nuwa do to make you hate her?"

"I don't hate her!" Hei Nuwang sprung up from her chair. "But it's the only way!"

"The only way to what? You're one of the most powerful people in the world! Why do you need to kill your own mother to conquer it?!" The warrior was angry now. In his case, he'd been betrayed. His father deserved what he got. But this was different, and Nuwa was Yujin's mother, too. Nuwa, who gave her life to save the world, who lent her own chi to create a seal to keep the fabled Wall of Heaven from...

The warrior started laughing softly.

"What could possibly be funny?" Hei Nuwang snarled.

The warrior chortled and took off his mask. "Yujin was right about me. I'm an idiot. I decided to serve you because I thought you were just another one of those crazies the panda is always fighting. They all wanted to take over the world, but you..." He dug his claws into the forehead of his mask, cursing his own willful ignorance. "You want to destroy it."

Amethyst veins started to form in the floor around Hei Nuwang's feet. "I have no intention of 'destroying' it."

"You know what will happen if the Wall of Heaven that separates the two realms crumbles. Both realms will come crashing together. Just a single hole torn in the wall caused carnage though half of China!"

"When you make a bowl of soup, don't you first have to chop the vegetables to mix them together? When you build a house, don't you first tear down the trees and break apart the stone to make the walls and roof?" Hei Nuwang replied. "Sometimes to make it easier to mix the ingredients to make something great, you have to first destroy them."

"But you have no control over this!"

Hei Nuwang punched the wall, causing a web of purple cracks. "This is not just about reckless mass destruction and loss of life! I have spent almost a thousand years preparing for this, and I will not stop now! Mother's brother Fuxi failed to make this realm the rapture it should have been, the demon king Ke Pa the same! But now I am one step away from finishing what they couldn't. I have the power, the plan, the _child_. Kill Su, and you will be remembered in history as the warrior who created paradise."

"No." the warrior spoke with no hesitation. He wanted revenge on the panda and his friends and master. Not this.

He heard a cracking sound behind him and turned his head. The door was completely encased in amethyst. "This is your last chance, mortal." Hei Nuwang spoke coldly. "Kill the girl."

The warrior shook his head. "If I'd known you would be making me do this, I would have never have sworn allegiance. I should have let the creature send me back to the Spirit Realm when it had the chance."

He knew what would happen next. He jumped, avoiding the purple spikes that shot up out the door. He rebounded off the ceiling, aiming his fist right at Hei Nuwang's abdomen. A wall of purple crystal shot up between them, and the warrior twisted in midair to avoid hitting it face first. Purple shackles shot out of cracks in the ceiling and caught him in mid air.

As he dangled and struggled, the wall disintegrated and Hei Nuwang strode up to him, purple fires dancing in her eyes. "You're right. You should've."


	11. Edge of Darkness

The masked warrior was surer than ever that the universe was punishing him for his multitudinous sins. Three recent events had convinced him of that fact.

Event one; after his disagreement with Hei Nuwang, he'd awoken in the treasure room, chained atop a stone block surrounded by golden warriors. Not only were the chains too strong to break quickly, the clinking of the metal links disturbed the warriors every time he tried to struggle. This was Hei Nuwang's punishment. A sadistic choice of death or death. Either keep making noise and get stabbed to death by false warriors or suffer a slower, more terrible demise. For some time the warrior had lain there, debating which fate he deserved most.

Event two; the Dragon Warrior, that fat panda of all people, showed up to bail him out of his predicament. Not only did he coax important information out of the masked warrior, he ignored the warrior demand to be left to his fate and freed him with the Sword of Heroes, triggering a brief battle with the golden warriors. After they escaped to the tomb, the panda rushed up the stairs to the throne room, leaving the warrior to lament that this was the second time the panda had saved his life.

Event three and the warrior's current predicament; a supernatural flood coming out of nowhere and threatening to cut his unwanted second life short. A flood of ice-cold water that seemed to have a voice of its own, spewing vicious death threats and curses. The warrior didn't hear all of them clearly, but one phrase was uttered more frequently than the rest, sticking to him like a bloodsucker. _Why did you do it?_

To add to the calamity, the palace was imploding from the inside after Hei Nuwang set off her last resort; the destruction of every room in the palace aside from the throne room. As the warrior climbed up the outside of the throne room, he cursed Hei Nuwang in furious whispers, wishing that he'd killed himself the moment he'd emerged from that oversized urn, especially after the revelation in the late Sutoraiki's laboratory.

The warrior had ventured there soon after the water appeared, seeking to answer at least a fraction of his questions before fleeing the palace. He'd found Sutoraiki dead, cleaved in two, along with the corpses of two soldiers. Unable to force the truth out the hare-brained hornet as he'd planned, the warrior had instead sought out his scrolls, finding them in a hidden compartment behind the shelf of chi. He'd been unable to stick around long enough to read all of them, but the contents of one scroll in particular haunted him as he climbed; the step-by-step process of the final prototype. _Me._

Every step had been depicted in a painted image of the warrior's naked form emerging from a large urn. They'd forcibly taken his soul from the Spirit Realm, used alchemy and Hei Nuwang's own chi to create a new body, and put the soul in it. All part of one final test before they moved on to the real deal; a red eyed panda as depicted in the last scroll he'd read before water spilled into the room and he'd run for his life. The scroll did not say who the panda had once been.

The warrior had been nothing more than a successful experiment they'd kept as an obedient pet. A tool to be used until it could be used no further. A slave to command until he revolted.

 _You were right, Yujin. I was a fool. Why did I do it?_

He heard the sounds of battle as he neared the top of the massive stone block that contained the throne room.

"Sister!" A voice cried. One of the fighters was Hei Nuwang. "Sister, do something!"

"I've done enough." The sister who replied did not sound like Yujin. It must be the other sister.

"You're right." Hei Nuwang snarled over the clashing of blades. "You have done enough. You've done more than enough to help me kill her precious hybrid. That's right, Yujin. She helped me invade the palace."

The warrior froze right before he looked over the edge. He and Yujin were more alike than he'd imagined. Both had been betrayed by the people who were supposed to love and support them, right as they were on the verge of fulfilling their dreams. This sister was one more person the warrior would have to kill.

The fighting stopped. The warrior lifted his body with his powerful arms and looked over the edge. Yujin had sunk a crystal dagger into Hei Nuwang's body.

"Hurts, doesn't it?" Yujin whispered. "That's for my baby, my mother, and everyone else you hurt, you monster."

With that she threw Hei Nuwang over the edge into the abyss. _Good riddance to bad trash_ , the warrior thought as he pulled himself up. He spotted the snake, the tigress and the badly wounded form of the panda. They didn't notice him, their gazes fixed on the two remaining sisters. Nearby was a crumbing hole in the stone full of water.

The dagger fell from Yujin's gloved paw and hit the floor tip first, sticking up like a black lily. She turned to the three kung fu masters. "I honestly hadn't expected her to risk her own life to end ours. Her mistake."

Her head turned very slightly towards the warrior. She knew he was there, even if the others did not. The warrior briefly turned his attention to one of the chains that held the throne room above the massive black pit. Near the top was a window on the palace's outer shell that was within jumping distance. That was his way out.

"Yujin, are you okay?" The panda asked.

Yujin didn't look as strong and powerful as she did before casting Hei Nuwang to the darkness. "I thought ending Hei Nuwang's life would give me pleasure. I was wrong. It's no surprise, really. No matter how I could have punished her, it would not change the past."

The warrior felt a twinge in his chest. He'd had the same thought more than once in his past life, after the betrayal. Then again, he'd never lost an infant son.

Then Yujin turned towards the pheasant, who was on her knees. The pheasant looked up at her, fear and grief in her eyes.

"What Hei Nuwang said..." Yujin asked softly. "Is it true, Mengxiang?"

Mengxiang clenched her feathered fists. "Sister, please..."

"Is it true?" Yujin's eyeholes started to spew fire. The panda and his friends huddled closer together. The warrior felt the air grow warm.

Mengxiang meekly nodded.

The warmth became a searing heat and the air turned red.

"Believe me. I never wanted this! I never wanted to make you suffer..." Mengxiang's voice trailed away as Yujin spoke.

"I thought it was my fault." She said, her voice steadily rising with the heat. "I thought Hei Nuwang succeeded because of my own carelessness."

"Yujin." The panda said weakly. Yujin ignored him.

"All these years..." She was snarling now. The edges of her body began to glow a reddish gold. "All these years I blamed myself... _and it was you!_ _You betrayed me!"_

The next thing the warrior knew, Yujin was on fire. As the flames of her rage twisted and spat embers, Yujin formed a small fireball in between two fingers and pointed them at Mengxiang's face.

"Yujin, no!" Viper shrieked. _Stay out of this_ , the warrior thought.

"Yujin, she tricked me too!" Mengxiang cried. "I thought we were taking you away! I didn't know she wanted to..."

 _"_ _Why couldn't you leave us alone?! Why didn't you leave us the hell alone?!"_ Yujin was screaming now, screaming and weeping, her tears pouring from her flaming eyeholes and melting the stone they dripped on. The warrior let out a low growl. This bird was the reason Yujin lost her son. She deserved whatever Yujin was about to do to her. The warrior maintained his distance and watched.

"I never wanted to hurt your baby!" Mengxiang was crying, too. "I don't understand why you wanted to conceive with a mortal, and I may never understand, but I never wanted to-"

 _"_ _That baby was mine!"_ Yujin screamed, the fireball spinning between her fingers like a deadly marble. _"I loved her! She was innocent and beautiful and you killed her!"_

Mengxiang paled beneath her already pale feathers. "Killed her?! She's not dead! I altered everyone's memories to make them believe you had a son and that he died in that fire!"

 _"_ _Tell me what you're talking about right now or I swear I will incinerate you into ash!"_ Yujin hissed.

Mengxiang sobbed. "I did it to keep Hei Nuwang from finding her until you healed. I-I sent her away to keep her safe."

Yujin was completely still except for the raging fire and the spinning fireball aimed between Mengxiang's eyes. _"Where is she?"_

Mengxiang was shaking like a leaf now. "I never wanted this, Yujin. I swear to mother I never wanted any of this..."

 _BOOM!_ The fireball had flown past Mengxiang's head and exploded into globs of lava on the stone. Another fireball flew past the other side as Mengxiang cowered. Yujin screamed with every fireball she fired from her fingers.

 _"_ _WHERE-" BOOM "IS-" BOOM! "MY-" BOOM! "DAUGHTER?!"_

"BAO GU!" Mengxiang shrieked from beneath her arms. The fireballs stopped and the pheasant lifted her head, her face completely soaked with tears. "There are no accidents, don't you understand?!" Yujin stared at her with burning eyes. It was so silent that the warrior could hear her breathing. "I know you won't forgive me, and I don't deserve it. But please believe me..." Mengxiang bowed so low her head touched the scorched stone. "I would never hurt either of you."

An eternity passed. Then the fireball in Yujin's paw dissipated. The air cooled and returned its normal hue. Yujin lowered her arm and stepped away as the flames engulfing her body died. She turned and looked right at the warrior.

The speechless warrior heard her voice in his head. _Get out of here before they see you._

Not wanting to be put back in prison, the warrior started climbing up the chain. As he neared the window he heard the panda shout, looked down and saw Yujin drop into the living water.

To the panda and his friends, it looked like she had just sacrificed himself to stop the flood. But the warrior knew better.

Yujin still had things worth living for. He wished he could say the same for himself.

* * *

 **With one chapter left, the time has come for me to give you a little hint. ;)**

 **When reading the story, click on the chapter menu so the chapter list will pop up. Then take a long, hard look at the list and see if you guessed right about the warrior's identity.**

 **Stay tuned for the final chapter!**


	12. Seed of Salvation

The Masked Man removed his mask and looked at himself in the polished silver shield. He took in his own features, the features he had not born since his death in that fateful battle. He'd only discovered the change when he'd fled to the river that flowed several miles from the palace and saw his reflection in the water. Somehow he knew that someone was responsible for this change. Whether it was the creature, the girl or the flood that had formed from their deaths, he didn't know but he did know that he wished they hadn't. Now he could never remove the mask in public again.

He used to have a name, but had given it up the moment he was reborn. Hei Nuwang had wanted to name him, but he'd refused. He wasn't worthy of a name. He'd lost his worth a long time ago, and he'd lost it again several weeks ago, just when he thought that nothing else could stand in his way. He was no longer that person, he thought. He pulled off his gauntlet and looked at the stump of his index finger. _This is his wound._ He thought of the carnage inflicted on the Valley so long ago. _Those were his crimes._ He thought of Tai Lung. _That was his name Not mine. If only the girl hadn't returned my true face. No, not true. False. Old. But I still have the mask._

As the Masked Man bid farewell to his old self for the last time, he felt that familiar fear, saw it in his reflection. His hiding place wouldn't be safe for much longer. He had to leave before the imperial soldiers found him.

Or something worse.


End file.
